You bring the recipe. We make it work at scale.
You own the formulation and you intend to keep owning it. We provide the plant, the process engineering and the food technologists to scale it from a kitchen batch to a production line without losing what made it work.
- The formulation, in writing
- You own
- 8-16 weeks to first batch
- Typical timeline
- NDA before you share anything
- Confidentiality
- Documented process parameters
- You receive
When contract manufacturing is the right answer
Ask one question: is your formulation the asset, or is your brand the asset?
If you have something genuinely difficult to replicate (a process, a blend, a technique), then it belongs to you and it should stay that way. Contract manufacturing is how you keep it while still using somebody else's plant.
If your real advantage is that you understand a consumer and can reach them, then white or private label will get you there faster and cheaper, and we will tell you so rather than sell you the more expensive option.
Most food businesses are brand businesses that believe they are formulation businesses. That belief is expensive.
What actually happens when a recipe meets a production line
This is the part founders underestimate, so it is worth being specific.
Heat transfer changes completely. A pan on a stove heats from the bottom with constant stirring. A 500 kg jacketed vessel heats from the walls, and the centre lags. Cooking times that worked at home produce a scorched edge and an undercooked middle at scale unless the process is re-engineered.
Thermal processing rewrites the recipe. If your product is going into a retort, it is about to spend a long time above 121°C. Vegetables soften. Spices bloom differently. Dairy proteins behave in ways they did not in your kitchen. You do not formulate for what goes into the retort. You formulate for what comes out.
Ingredients behave differently in bulk. Hydrocolloids that dispersed fine in a whisk clump in a 500 kg batch. Spice blends that tasted balanced at 200 g taste harsh at scale because the volatile fraction distributes differently.
None of this means your recipe is wrong. It means somebody has to do the engineering between a recipe and a process, and that is what our technologists are for.
Your intellectual property
We put this in writing, every time:
- Confidentiality agreement before disclosure. You do not send us anything until it is signed.
- You own the formulation. Including any modifications made during scale up, unless we agree otherwise in advance.
- You receive the process documentation. Schedule, critical control points, specification. It is yours, and it is portable to another plant.
- No competing use. We do not use your formulation for our own label or for another client.
Ask any manufacturer for these four things in writing. How readily they agree tells you a great deal about how they will behave later.
Where we are honest about limits
Six of our 24 lines run at vetted units in our manufacturing network rather than under our own roof: freeze drying, heat pump drying, vacuum freezing, vacuum frying, virgin coconut oil and cold-press oil extraction. If your product needs one of those, we will say so, and we will manage the specification, trials, quality verification and logistics so you still deal with one counterparty.
If your product needs a technology neither we nor our network has, we will tell you that too.
How it works
- 1
NDA first
We sign a confidentiality agreement before you send us a recipe, an ingredient list or a sample. Not after the first meeting: before.
- 2
Feasibility review
Our technologists assess whether your recipe can run on a production line, which of our lines suits it, and what will have to change. Sometimes the answer is that it needs a different process than you assumed. We say so early.
- 3
Scale up trials
A recipe that works for four portions frequently does not survive a 500 kg batch. Heat transfer changes, mixing behaves differently, and a thermal process does things to texture and flavour that a stovetop never does. We work through that at pilot scale.
- 4
Pilot batch and validation
A real batch in real packaging, plus accelerated shelf life study. For thermally processed product we run a heat penetration study and establish an F0-validated process schedule specific to your product and pack size.
- 5
Production, and the documentation you own
We run the commercial batch and hand back documented process parameters: the schedule, the critical control points, the specification. That documentation is yours and you can take it to another plant.
Questions
Will you sign an NDA before I share my recipe?
Yes, and we insist on it before you send anything, not after a first meeting. You should not disclose a formulation to any manufacturer without one, and a manufacturer who is reluctant to sign is telling you something useful.
Who owns the formulation after scale up?
You do, including modifications made during scale up, and we put that in the agreement. You also receive documented process parameters (the schedule, critical control points and specification), which are yours and portable to another plant if you ever move.
How long does it take to scale my recipe?
Typically eight to sixteen weeks to a first commercial batch. That covers feasibility review, scale up trials, a pilot batch in real packaging, and accelerated shelf life validation. For thermally processed products it also includes a heat penetration study to establish an F0-validated process schedule specific to your product and pack size.
What if my recipe does not work at scale?
It usually needs adjustment rather than abandonment, and our technologists work through that with you. Occasionally a product genuinely does not suit any process we have, in which case we tell you early rather than taking your money through a development cycle that was never going to work.
Can you handle export documentation?
We supply Certificates of Analysis with every batch, documented process schedules and recorded F0 values as standard. Destination-specific certification requirements vary (FDA registration for the United States, EU compliance for Europe) and we will tell you plainly what we hold and what you would need to arrange.
Other ways we work
White label & private label
The fastest route from an idea to a product people can buy. Take a formulation that is already developed, tested and running on our line, put your brand on the pack, and skip the eight to sixteen weeks that development would otherwise cost you.
Facility on rental
Rent our licensed facility by the batch or the shift, bring your raw material, and produce your own product under our supervision. It suits founders validating a product, brands who would rather not share a formulation at all, and seasonal producers who do not want equipment idle for ten months.
Product development
Formulation development, scale up, shelf life validation and regulatory review. This is the team that tells you why your product will not survive the process: before you have printed 20,000 laminates that say it will.